Category Archives: piston

Reviving a $25 Generator

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[Jennies Garage] found a used and abused inverter based generator in the clearance section of his local home improvement store. The generator had been returned on a warranty claim and was deemed uneconomical to fix. Originally $799, [Jennies Garage] picked it up for just $25. He documented his quest to get the device running with a trio of videos.

The generator had spark, but didn’t want to fire. The only obvious problem was the fact that the machine had been overfilled with oil. There was little or no compression, but that is not uncommon with modern small engines – many …read more

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From Foot Pump Cylinders To Pneumatic Robot Fighting Arm

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[James Bruton] is well known for making robots using electric motors but he’s decided to try his hand at using pneumatics in order to make a fighting robot. The pneumatic cylinders will be used to give it two powerful punching arms. In true [James Bruton] fashion, he’s started with some experiments first, using the pneumatic cylinders from foot pumps. The cylinders he’s tried so far are taken out of single cylinder foot pumps from Halfords Essentials, costing only £6.29, around $8.11 US. That’s far cheaper than a commercial pneumatic cylinder, and perfectly adequate for this first step.

He did have …read more

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From Foot Pump Cylinders To Pneumatic Robot Fighting Arm

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[James Bruton] is well known for making robots using electric motors but he’s decided to try his hand at using pneumatics in order to make a fighting robot. The pneumatic cylinders will be used to give it two powerful punching arms. In true [James Bruton] fashion, he’s started with some experiments first, using the pneumatic cylinders from foot pumps. The cylinders he’s tried so far are taken out of single cylinder foot pumps from Halfords Essentials, costing only £6.29, around $8.11 US. That’s far cheaper than a commercial pneumatic cylinder, and perfectly adequate for this first step.

He did have …read more

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Custom Hydraulic Cylinders from Off-the-Shelf Components

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When your project needs power, you might need to turn to hydraulics. There is a lot of mystery about fluid power, but there is also a huge supply chain devoted to getting you the parts you need to power your project. Off-the-shelf components may not fit your application though, in which case it might be handy to know how to build your own custom hydraulic cylinders.

While it’s true that custom cylinder builds are pretty common, it’s still interesting to see the process [MakeItExtreme] used. Starting with an off-the-shelf piston and gland, this double-acting cylinder build is a pretty straightforward …read more

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